42 



LIFE OF PROFESSOR HUXLEY chap, hi 



difference in our years, but she is in fact as much younger than 

 her years as I am older than mine. Next, as to complexion she 

 is exceedingly fair, with the Saxon yellow hair and blue eyes. 

 Then as to face, I really don't know whether she is pretty or not. 

 I have never been able to decide the matter in my own mind. 

 Sometimes I think she is, and sometimes I wonder how the idea 

 ever came into my head. Whether or not, her personal appear- 

 ance has nothing whatever to do with the hold she has upon my 

 mind, for I have seen hundreds of prettier women. But I never 

 met with so sweet a temper, so self-sacrificing and affectionate a 

 disposition, or so pure and womanly a mind, and from the per- 

 fectly intimate footing on which I stand with her family I have 

 plenty of opportunities of judging. As I tell her, the only great 

 folly I am aware of her being guilty of was the leaving her 

 happiness in the hands of a man like myself, struggling upwards 

 and certain of nothing. 



As to my future intentions I can say very little about them. 

 With my present income, of course, marriage is rather a bad look 

 out, but I do not think it would be at all fair towards N. herself 

 to leave this country without giving her a wife's claim upon 

 me. ... It is very unlikely I shall ever remain in the colony. 

 Nothing but a very favourable chance could induce me to 

 do so. 



Much must depend upon how things go in England. If my 

 various papers meet with any success, I may perhaps be able to 

 leave the service. At present, however, I have not heard a word 

 of anything I have sent. Professor Forbes has, I believe, pub- 

 lished some of MacGillivray's letters to him, but he has appar- 

 ently forgotten to write to MacGillivray himself, or to me. So 

 I shall certainly send him nothing more, especially as Mr. Mac- 

 Leay (of this place, and a great man in the naturalist world) 

 has offered to get anything of mine sent to the Zoological 

 Society. 



In the paper mentioned in the letter of March 21, above 

 (" On the Anatomy and Affinities of the Family of the 

 Medusae "), Huxley aimed at " giving broad and general 

 views of the whole class, considered as organised upon a 

 given type, and inquiring into its relations with other fam- 

 ilies," unlike previous observers whose patience and ability 

 had been devoted rather to " stating matters of detail con- 

 cerning particular genera and species." At the outset, sec- 

 tion 8 {Sci. Mem., i. 11), he states — 



